We’re plenty active and we challenge the interfaith community to live up to their ideals. I don’t think they like that. It’s far easier after all to believe everyone is the same as you, but the real test of interfaith values is how you treat people with whom you have nothing in common but a supposed commitment to your faith. (Galina Krasskova, Interfaith matters and polytheists know it)
Gus diZerega had the audacity to claim that no one is being told that polytheism is confusing or to water down their rituals at interfaith and pagan pride events. So Aine* provided a link to Oracle’s account of that precise thing happening which prompted Don Frew to go off on a long tirade accusing Oracle of either misunderstanding what took place or lying about it. When Ruadhán explained that it was bad form to dictate a person’s experience for them and compared such behavior to those who tell trans people that they’re not really being discriminated against while job-hunting Gus began frothing at the mouth and threatened to delete any further comments by Ruadhán.
This is becoming increasingly commonplace. For instance the individual** who accused devotional polytheists of advocating baby-murder and slavery posted shortly afterwards that they would only let through comments that agreed with them, no matter how civil that dissent was. (And I saw one of the comments they refused to approve – ha! I wish I got criticism so pleasant!)
Though I find such cowardice and refusal to engage in honest discourse shameful in the extreme (you’ve got no problem dishing it out but piss yourself when anyone questions you?) at least something good has come out of all of this, namely Ruadhán’s proposal, On invitations and Etiquette.
Ruadhán starts off by observing:
Polytheists didn’t ask to be lumped in with the pagan community, but by happen-stance, here we are, a part of the community, whether you or I or others like it or not. Some of us keep our distance from the community for often personal reasons, some of us maintain a relationship with the pagan community for often political or social reasons (though it’s ultimately up to each individual polytheist why they do or do not participate in the pagan community). If you maintain that we need to be invited, then you are maintaining that we are a completely separate community, and certain etiquette needs to be taken into consideration, should we take that invitation. If you maintain that we need no invitation, then why not treat us with the respect to practise our own rituals as we see most fit, and maintain our own sense of piety and devotion that everyone else who lives here gets?
And then proceeds to give four suggestions that I think, if followed, could alleviate a lot of the tension and hurt feelings we see on display so regularly. I know that I am going to strive to keep these principles in mind (along with Del’s Some, Many, Most) and I hold out hope that others will as well. At least some others. Judging by Don’s comments, it seems some people are really invested in the role of white knight spokesperson, no matter how unwanted it is:
If folks like me don’t at least TRY to speak for you in a LIMITED and QUALIFIED way to the broader interfaith community, then you can guarantee that you will NEVER be invited, because the broader interfaith community won’t know you exist.
If the choice is between them not knowing about us or them knowing only what folks like you tell them about us, Mr. Frew, I’ll stick with obscurity. Especially considering your treatment of polytheists in the past.
* I’ve had my disagreements with Aine before but she has more than earned my respect with how she’s been handling herself during this latest skirmish and the wonderful content she’s been producing for her blog. May the Otherfaith thrive and prosper!
** I’d provide a link but every time I do people crow about the boost in their stats, so I intend to deprive this particular troll of the attention they oh so desperately crave.
Tagged: paganism, polytheism
